This invention relates to an apparatus for applying a finish or other treatment fluid to a yarn, filament or bundle of filaments.
Various types of applicators which employ nozzles or jets to apply a treatment fluid, such as a coating, dye or chemical treatment, to a fiber are known. (See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,686,123 to Levan, U.S. Pat. No. 4,714,045 to Reinehr, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,978,695 to Hurzeler, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,004,865 to Schmitz and U.S. Pat. No. 2,377,655 to Stanley, et al.
Other known applicators employ rollers (See U.S. Pat. No. 4,704,311 to Pickering, et al.), spinning discs (See U.S. Pat. No. 4,338,876 to Norton) rotatable dishes (See U.S. Pat. No. 3,540,240 to Higashino) and reels (See U.S. Pat. No. 2,294,870 to Kline, et al.) to deliver coatings or treatments to a filament.
These previously known applicators are complicated, containing many components and thus many opportunities for malfunction. Additionally, due to their complexity, they are fairly expensive to produce and repairs to these applicators normally require fairly lengthy downtime.
The applicator described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,893,472 to Louch, et al. is one in which a traveling textile strand or yarn is aligned and guided into and through an open applicator channel which extends along the length of an elongated face of an elongated polyhedron. The applicator described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,051,807 to Graf, et al. includes an applicator head having a guide edge against which a filament bundle is passed and at which the filament bundle is exposed to the treatment. Disadvantages of this applicator include the fact that there is no means for maintaining the filament bundle against the guide edge, and that both sides of the filament bundle cannot be simultaneously treated.